On Game Of Thones. Or “whose fantasy is it anyway”

So. Game of Thrones is rapey. Who knew.
This comes as no surprise to me.
I’ve known THAT since Deanerys Targeryan was married off to the Dothraki King who proceeded to rape her, as was his droit-de-seigneur.
Come on, every other scene has someone copulating enthusiastically with another.
Often exploitative , always directed for the male gaze.
Even incest.
Yawn.

So. I’m not exactly flabbergasted when finally, that same incestuous relationship’s latest twist is a rape.
Cue the normal howls of protest and surprised horror.
Cue the “it’s not like that in the book” protests.
Cue the menz, explaining that it’s all “part of the plot”*
Double yawn.

What has given me pause, however, is the women who’ve defended it.
One in particular , obtusely enquiring how anyone could possibly have a problem, since couldn’t we see it wasn’t “real life” , it was “obviously” just ” fantasy”.
And ergo , not a problem.

Here we bloody go again.
Do I really NEED to wonder about the health of a mindset that has such a fantasy?
Do I really NEED to express exasperation that such a fantasy is still deemed ok, cuz “fantasy yanno”?
Is it just me(I sure hope not) who’s fed up of male authors, male TV producers, male directors, all using the word fantasy to render anodyne the portrayal of the main weapon in patriarchy’s arsenal , rape?
Is it just me who’s getting mightily fucked off when this male fantasy , MEN’S “rape fantasy” is elided to be the same as some women’s fantasies of consensually succumbing to ardent lovers, and projected onto women as THEIR rape fantasy – and then used against women who protest this to portray said women as anti sex, prudes, and denying of our nature?

Look . There is no such “thing” as “consensual non consent”. It’s oxymoronic for good reason. Women who claim to have this as a fantasy aren’t displaying a perverse desire to be subjected to actual rape. They are fantasising about “yielding”, ceding control, but they are fantasising about doing so with AGENCY.
MILLIONS of women live with the reality of rape. They have no truck with imagined fantasies of their lived hell.
Those who entertain themselves with “consensual non consent know the difference.
And any women who say otherwise are either woefully ignorant , unusually thick, or spectacular in their levels of internalised misogyny.**

So. Back to the aforesaid rape scene.
The same – female – “it’s only fantasy” – nitwit then posited that if such as I didn’t like it, there’s always self imposed “content block”. Quite apart from the glaringly patronising nature of that remark it also displays an almost admirable talent for missing the point.

I don’t buy porn. But it’s everywhere. I don’t find violence entertaining. But it’s everywhere.
They’re peddled as entertainment. As fantasy.
And the fact that they’re peddled as such lends credence to the argument that not only are such fantasies natural, and normal, but that they are acceptable.

The fact that this male rape fantasy still hangs around like a piss in a swimming pool is bad enough, but that it’s becoming , I’ll say it gain, anodyne and banal , that it’s remaining entertainment, is probably as insidious a threat to women’s safety as the co-opting of gender.

Cuz hey, whatever we protest about the rape fantasy, if its that normalised, it must be true.
And if rape fantasy is acceptable…..then rape…..

___________________________________________

*”All part of the plot” . Ok. But does it really need to portrayed in such an explicit, salacious manner? Well?

** So much so they don’t even pause to consider that even the very idea of rape is, in itself , deeply problematic in an entertainment context.

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4 thoughts on “On Game Of Thones. Or “whose fantasy is it anyway””

It really bothers me that ‘it’s just fantasy’ is seen as the default response. I think it makes it hugely more difficult for women to counter cultural stereotypes, when we’re constantly being told that half of them don’t matter, because they’re ‘just stories’ or ‘just fantasy’.

Yet fiction is the context in which people have always learned how to think about human behaviour.